ut it. Only the fact that the scarecrow seemed
to throw a look at her now and then kept her from eating more. Somehow
she couldn't forget that he acted very gentlemanly, though his clothes
were tattered and torn. And she felt that she must do nothing to offend
him.

"The corn is as good as any I've ever tasted," she assured him.

The scarecrow showed that he must have heard her, for he gave a sort of
nod. And he tried his best to touch his hat. But the wind wasn't blowing
quite hard enough to let him do that. "Poor fellow!" the Muley Cow
thought. "He hasn't the entire use of his arms."

Then the scarecrow went through some odd motions. First he kicked
backward with one leg; then he kicked forward with the other; and after
that he whirled three times around the stake that supported him.

"Now, what can he mean by that?" the Muley Cow wondered. And then all at
once she gave a silly sort of giggle. "I know!" she exclaimed. "He
wants me to dance with him!"

For a moment the Muley Cow forgot that she was the oldest cow on the
farm. She tossed her head, flirted her heels in the air, and cut a few
clumsy capers around the scarecrow, who did his best to dance a
jig--only the wind died down completely just as he was in the middle of
it. And he hung from his pole in such a woebegone fashion that the Muley
Cow began to feel uneasy about him.

"You're not ill, I hope?" she ventured, as she stopped her prancing.

He paid not the slightest heed to her. So with her nose the Muley Cow
touched him where a knee would have been, had he had any. And even then
he hung motionless.

The Muley Cow was alarmed. But she didn't linger to find out what was
the matter with the scarecrow. She heard shouting. And she heard old
dog Spot barking. And knowing at once that Farmer Green had caught her
in the cornfield she turned and fled as fast as she could go.

"Something's wrong with that scarecrow," she muttered to herself as she
lumbered along toward the barnyard. "He's so kind and gentlemanly he
would surely have warned me if he had been able to. He would have let me
know that Farmer Green was coming."

VI

BUFFALO HUNTS

Johnnie Green found, after a while, that owning a cow wasn't all fun.
There were times when he would have been willing to let his father, or
the hired man, milk the Muley Cow. For instance, a boy from a
neighboring farm might come along about milking-time with a fine plan
for play. Or someone driving past the